Mata: I've hit new level under boss

While the Blues, who face Liverpool in the Barclays Premier League on Sunday, won the Champions League last season, their brand of football was far from universally admired. That has changed this season, though, with former Valencia man Mata at the heart of their new dynamic style.

"I think the football we're playing has taken the club, and my game, to a different level," Mata told the Daily Mirror. "We are playing the kind of football I have always loved to play, with freedom up front, all of us trying to pass and create with quality."